Social skills-a-thon

One piece of job-hunting advice you’ll hear over and over again is that you have to network to land a gig.

Unfortunately, networking isn’t easy for everyone and doing it badly can cause more harm than good.

So what is networking exactly?

“The exchange of information or services among individuals, groups, or institutions; specifically: the cultivation of productive relationships for employment or business,” according to Merriam-Webster.

The key part of the definition is the word “exchange.” Too often people think networking means you just harass people until they give you a job or help you make a connection. But browbeating your LinkedIn connections into getting you a job, for example, won’t get you much job-hunting honey.

“Do not monopolize the conversation [by talking] about your career needs,” said stressed Thom Singer, author of “The ABC’s of Networking.”